The current practice of determining transducer position in magnetic storage devices during accessing and following data tracks on a rotating medium such as a disk is through amplitude measurement of signals from adjoining servo tracks thereby generating a net signal indicative of the radial displacement from a predetermined track centerline. As track densities have increased, the capability of this practice has been enlarged by progressing from dibit to tribit to pentabit servo formats thereby increasing the number of tracks in the capture area, and enabling a more precise track identification.
One of the problems with the current practices has been the susceptibility to inaccuracy as a result of random electrical noise occurring during the servo signal window. To mitigate this disability, the servo format has, in the past, used redundant signals which are averaged to obtain a more uniform approximation.